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Technology Stocks : Micron Only Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Skeeter Bug who wrote (50561)	2/24/2000 1:41:00 PM
From: DJBEINO	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 53903

Micron's Lehi facility to open — partially By Sharon Haddock Deseret News staff writer LEHI — Micron Technology Inc. is moving some testing operations into its mostly vacant, mostly unfinished Lehi production plant. Buoyed by an encouraging fiscal year 2000 first quarter profit report — and a lack of space at the company's Boise plant — Micron is making way for hundreds of new employees in Lehi. After two years of disappointing losses totalling more than $300 million, the memory-chip business posted earnings of $341 million, or $1.19 per share, for the first quarter of 2000, which ended Dec. 2, 1999. Corporate officials report sales are up and more chips are being purchased at higher prices. That's good news for Utah County because the huge, mostly empty buildings on the hillside in Lehi will finally see some use. But Micron spokesman Grant C. Jones said this move isn't a "full-speed-ahead" signal for the Utah plant. "This isn't it," said Jones Wednesday morning, following earlier news reports that Micron is ready to activate its Lehi plant after a long winter's nap. "Let me emphasize that. This is not the opening of the plant, although we still plan to do that in the future . . . We will be opening a test facility at Lehi." Jones described the decision as an efficiency move. "What really prompted this is we are in need of space here in Boise and we have plenty of space in Lehi," he said. "It just made sense and to tell you the truth, it's always been the plan to have test activities in Lehi." Jones said workers in Boise have just been told about the opportunity to relocate to Utah County. They will have the option to move. He said Micron will start with about 50 people within the next two months and phase in up to a couple hundred by February 2001. "We don't expect a huge number to come from Boise, so we'll mostly be hiring local people," Jones said. "Technical, operations — the whole gambit." Stan Lockhart, a Utah County-based Micron spokesman, said Micron has an extensive training program. Information is available at the Utah Department of Workforce Services. Micron came to Utah County in 1994 with a $2.5 billion project that had local officials and even the governor singing its praises, promising between 3,500 and 4,000 higher-paying jobs in the computer industry. After a downturn in the market as a result of an oversupply of dynamic random access memory chips, Micron halted construction, mothballed the facility and hired a crew to maintain the structures which contain about 2.3 million square feet of space. Fewer than 200 workers have been employed to keep the space ready for a market upswing. Is this the start of such an upswing? "We're hoping the market continues to improve," Jones said. "We're always cautiously optimistic, but we're not saying that's what is happening." deseretnews.com